Listed re-commerce business musicMagpie, a circular economy pioneer specialising in refurbished consumer technology, is expanding its SMARTDrop Kiosk network.
The expansion programme started this week with three new high profile and high footfall sites at Manchester Arndale (Manchester), Cribbs Causeway (Bristol) and Willow Brook (Bristol).
Each of the sites are within major shopping centres and together attract over 50m visitors per year.
Stockport-headquartered musicMagpie completed an initial rollout of 290 SMARTDrop Kiosks into Asda stores across the UK in October 2022, and these latest shopping centre kiosks, along with The Trafford Centre (Manchester) kiosk announced earlier this year, represent additional installations in complementary locations, giving greater access to a wider range of customers.
For customers, the kiosks offer an even faster and easier way to recycle unwanted phones for instant cash.
Customers take their phone to a kiosk, receive a valuation, deposit it and then have the money paid to their bank or PayPal account within minutes.
SMARTDrop Kiosks have proved to be hugely popular with customers since their launch in November 2020, and now account for 45 per cent of musicMagpie’s consumer technology sourcing in the UK.
The group is looking to expand the reach of its SMARTDrop Kiosks by placing them in new high footfall sites across the country, making selling and recycling mobile devices even more convenient and accessible for consumers.
Steve Oliver, chief executive officer and co-founder of musicMagpie, said: “We’re thrilled to announce that our SMARTDrop Kiosks will be arriving at three new major locations this week, following the successful rollout in Asda stores across the country.
“Our SMARTDrop Kiosk in The Trafford Centre has been one of our most successful installations to-date, and with millions of people visiting each of these new sites every year these will serve to increase brand awareness and promote the service making it easier than ever for customers to trade in their phone for cash, while doing something positive for the environment.”
Operating through two trusted brands – musicMagpie in the UK and decluttr in the US – musicMagpie’s core strategy is simple: to provide consumers with a smart, sustainable and trusted way to buy, rent and sell refurbished consumer technology and physical media products with sustainability at the heart of its operations.
The firm was founded by current CEO Steve Oliver and Walter Gleeson from a garage in Hazel Grove in 2007 and underwent an IPO in London in 2021.
Nearly 400,000 consumer technology products were resold in FY22. In addition, the group re-sells approximately 10m books and disc media each year that could have ended up as waste.